


To Win The Game You Kill The King

by Smiley5494



Series: The Persephone Universe [2]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Acephobia, Adopted Children, BAMF Number Five | The Boy (Umbrella Academy), BAMF Persephone, BAMF character, Character Study, Child Abuse, Child Murder, Child Neglect, Child Soldiers, Childhood Trauma, Don't Like Don't Read, Everyone Has Issues, Everyone Is Gay, Everyone Needs A Hug, F/F, Homophobia, Hurt No Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'm Sorry, Internalized Acephobia, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, No Incest, Not Beta Read, Persephone is an asexual gay, Podfic Welcome, Suicidal Thoughts, added a section at the end so reread it for the full story., all the hargreeves are mentioned, in some way, it doesnt really get better, thats a lie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 08:28:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21715114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smiley5494/pseuds/Smiley5494
Summary: She’s eight and she’s been named after a queen who was kidnapped and forced into a marriage she would never have chosen. She’s named after a goddess who ate the fruit, who ate just six little pomegranate seeds and sealed her fate.She can’t help but think that maybe she’s being played, maybe she's just a pawn in a greater game, directed by the fates. That maybe being named after a child who was kidnapped and tricked into becoming a queen, was more relevant than she had ever thought before.She can't help but think that maybe her six little pomegranate seeds have already been eaten.Maybe she lost before she even began.She's eight and knowing that to win the game you have to know what you're playing. That Reginald Hargreeves is a master at his game.She's eight and she knows that to win the game she has to kill the king.
Series: The Persephone Universe [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1535063
Comments: 5
Kudos: 50





	To Win The Game You Kill The King

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [little white lies](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21710182) by [Soulykins](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Soulykins/pseuds/Soulykins). 

In hindsight, it started with a madman. Her birth and a gift or a curse—maybe somehow both at once. The game started when he bought her, _(his praises sung by those who didn’t know, the mindless masses, the ones who never knew what the umbrella academy truly was—an excuse for child soldiers)_, when he turned his eyes on her and her siblings. 

He made the first move. He bought eight children and raised them as competitors, with the knowledge of how to kill and the training and raw power to back it up.

He made the first move; directing his pawns with the skill of a master.

To win the game she had to be better. 

She had to be _extraordinary_.

* * *

He took the first move, a gamble, one that rung true, but still a gamble. He bought eight children and named them in order of when he "acquired" them.

She waited.

She waited and watched. She knew the game before she even knew what a game was.

He moved his _experiments_ as though they were pawns. 

Her first move wasn't her telepathy, nor was it her telekinesis. 

Her first move was knowledge. 

The knowledge that the stakes on this game were a matter of life or death. That for every piece lost she had to take two. 

Her first move was realising that as Five wrapped lies and disguises of arrogance around himself like a suit of armour and One strove to be perfect, with Two fast on his heels. She, as Number Eight, had to make a bigger move, she had to challenge the master in his contest. She had to change the game.

She became a queen long before she was named. She changed the game, she played her own rules and she rose the stakes.

After all, to win the game you have to know how the game is played.

* * *

She’s two and the nannies are being instructed to teach them.

From the nannies thoughts, she knows it isn't normal. That most kids don't start "school" until they're four-to-six. She knows that this is another move by Reginald, to age them mentally, to ready them for his agenda. She goes along with this one, excelling in academia, taking the spotlight away from the others. She does it her way though, at her own pace. She excelled at languages and stories but left the others space to rise. Both One and Seven excelled at training. Seven was the most powerful but One was the favourite. 

It took far too long for her to get used to the speed and sounds of training. Of the textures of weapons in her hands, of a wooden staff, and metal guns, of steel knives and kitchen appliances.

* * *

She's three and personal training is a thing. 

She's being taken into a room with only her opponent in this game that is life. She's told to do exactly what he says when he says it.

This is his move. 

Hers will wait.

She's three and she could kill a grown man without lifting a finger.

_(They tested it when she'd mastered the basics of her powers.)_

But she doesn't, she lets Reginald live because she is a child and as much as she knows what he does is wrong, he is also the only one who knows what to do with their powers. She knows that if she kills him her siblings will be separated and she can't have that. She will wait.

* * *

She's four and her sister has been violated in a way that is more private than anything she can come up with. Little Seven rebelled and the price she paid was worse than anything anyone could've suspected. 

She's four and she thinks she fears what her other sister can do far more than any punishment Reginald can come up with. Even taking away her powers. After all, if it weren't for Three, everyone would still remember Seven's true power. If it weren't for Three, she would be able to speak to her siblings without an adult present.

* * *

She's five and there's a new player in the game.

It's been half a decade but Number Five is fire and passion and deceit all wrapped up in one. He spits lies as easily as breathing and she knows he's on her side, but she has to stay ahead of him as well, or the others would pay the price.

She realises Five is playing too when Four breaks a vase.

Two, Four and Six are playing in the lounge room when Four runs into a table. It wobbles ominously and the vase falls. Five pops into the room in an instant, and the others file in shortly after. Reginald Hargreeves is there a minute later.

They're lined up and told that if the person who did it doesn't step forward they all will be punished.

Seconds before she could, Five does. He stands there and says that he did it, the lie falling from his lips as easily as they do from hers.

He comes back with bruises up and down his arms and a smug but pained look on his face. It says that he would not be broken. It said that he was a player in Reginald's game, one to be taken seriously.

She can't quite bring herself to trust him with her knowledge of how everyone reacts to certain things. How they think.

* * *

She's six when she writes down everything she knows about the dangerous game she is playing. It's written in Greek and hidden under her bed beneath the loose floorboard. 

She had money stashed down there and something of her siblings' that carries sentimental value:

\- One's first model rocket, the small one that got replaced the year before.

\- Two's first throwing knife, the one that he'd lost in the courtyard. 

\- The bottle of nail polish that Three first painted Four, Seven and her nails with. It was messy but she'd loved it. 

\- Four's first knitted project, a lumpy woollen mess that she treasured with all her heart. 

\- Five's crayon drawing of all of them, in blue, and signed _"5ive"_. 

\- Six's first book, the one he'd first learnt to read with and had read to her. 

\- She kept the sheet music to Seven's first song she'd learnt to play for all of them.

The only other thing under the floorboard was detailed notes on their powers and everything she knew about Grace. They were hidden there for safekeeping, just in case something happened to her or Three's rumours stuck.

She's six when Two discovers his secondary powers: holding his breath indefinitely. The way he discovered them was terrifying for all. They were training in fighting around water when Two fell in and didn't come back up. He'd hit his head on the way down and was under for a couple of minutes. During that time he'd stayed conscious and held his breath but was too dizzy to know which way was up and which was down.

One dove under and pulled Two up and when they all realised what had happened, they were all relieved that Two was safe. Reginald Hargreeves had no idea on how to be a decent human being and started testing them all for secondary powers and training with the ones discovered. (Just Two's holding breath power.)

She can't help but feel like she's failed to protect her siblings.

She knows Five feels the same.

* * *

She's seven when they start going on stealth missions. 

Meaning they do their job and the public never finds out. 

It's at that point that they start getting sent on solo and paired missions. She tends to be paired with Three or Five, their powers complementing each other well. Four doesn't get sent on those missions, he's getting to the point when the ghosts start scaring him.

Each time she gets sent on one of those missions her targets end up either seriously injured, brain-dead or completely dead. She adds to her collection under her floorboard. She updates her notes.

She rises in Reginald Hargreeves' favour.

He lowers his guard.

_His mistake._

* * *

She's eight and she receives a name. Grace (who has become Mother) calls her Persephone.

She’s eight and she’s been named after a queen who was kidnapped and forced into a marriage she would never have chosen. She’s named after a goddess who ate the fruit, who ate just six little pomegranate seeds and sealed her fate. 

She can’t help but think that maybe she’s being played, maybe she's just a pawn in a greater game, directed by the fates. That maybe being named after a child who was kidnapped and tricked into becoming a queen, was more relevant than she had ever thought before.

She can't help but think that maybe her seeds have already been eaten. 

_Maybe she lost before she even began._

She's eight and knows that sometimes she doesn't feel human. That it was wrong to grow up without a name.

She keeps updating her growing collection under her floorboard. Her notes are extensive and detailed.

She's eight and she starts to question the rules of the game.

* * *

She's nine and her kill count rivals Ben's. Little Six with his powers trained to kill.

She doesn't have an excuse. 

Just that it's easier to destroy than it is to create.

Sometimes she thinks that her name fits her more than just in a mythological sense. 

She wonders if Mother saw something in her. 

Something dark enough to get a name meaning _'the destroyer'._ A Greek name, derived from _pertho_ 'to destroy' and _phone_ 'murder'. 

Persephone. 

The Destroyer.

It fits.

She wears death and lies like a second skin, she has been playing the game since the moment she was born and she's become a master.

Her notes are growing along with the things she'd stolen off her siblings. Her savings reach peaks. She thinks that soon she'll have enough to get her siblings to run away with her.

* * *

She's ten and Klaus sneaks a naughty magazine in to show everyone.

Looking at the pictures makes her feel sick.

No one else seems to have that reaction.

Five doesn't seem interested, but all the others are giggling and pointing. The magazine is passed around to each of them, even Vanya, and when it's handed to her she nearly runs. Just the thought of what the others are talking about makes her feel sick and uncomfortable.

She wonders if she's broken.

She wonders if Reginald Hargreeves has already won. 

She considers clearing out her floorboard.

Instead, her notes grow and her collection nearly doubles.

She doesn't consider running.

* * *

She's eleven and a girl her age stops her while she's following a target. The girl's name is Olivia. 

Olivia asks if she's seen her parents. She says no, but offers to help.

While she's finding Olivia's parents the two started speaking. She finds herself liking Olivia a lot. The girl is funny and charming and optimistic and she finds that she understands what the books mean when they speak of romance.

The thought scares her and when Olivia finds her parents she says the bare minimum and leaves as soon as she could.

Her target ends up dead and she learns what gay means. 

A book about sexual, romantic and gender orientations joins her collection (she doesn't dare read it, not yet).

* * *

She's twelve and what happened when they were five is happening again.

This time she speaks up first.

Five won't give up though. They have both become experts in diverting attention and lies are the foundation of who they are. One day they said their first lies to Reginald and they have never stopped, not until even they couldn't distinguish between lies and reality. Not even when they lost what made them, themselves

She has to do something to keep the attention on her. To stop her siblings from being punished for a simple accident.

She's twelve and taller than her siblings. She looks Reginald Hargreeves in the eye and plays one of her trump cards. She knows how Reginald Hargreeves will react but not any of the others.

"I'm gay," she says loudly, looking him in the eye. It is the first time she has told a truth to Reginald Hargreeves.

He grabs her by the arm and she doesn't see her siblings for a couple of days.

When she does she thinks that maybe they won't recognise her covered in this many bruises.

They all help ease her pain and tell her they're proud. Even Klaus who recently discovered drugs helps her.

She thinks that's what family could be.

She doesn't understand why she feels so tired, why nothing seems to matter that much anymore.

She wants to go to sleep and not wake up.

She thinks maybe she could stop playing.

She updates her notes and collections instead.

* * *

She's thirteen and all she wants to do is stop playing the awful game that she's been playing her whole life.

She wants to tip over her king and surrender.

She tells Five about the loose floorboard under her bed. She tells him to only look when she's not a player anymore. He tells her not to do anything rash but agrees.

He disappears the next day.

She's powerless to stop him.

He doesn't come back. He tipped over his king before she could tip hers.

One player is down. She has to keep going. 

She has to or Reginald wins.

She updates her notebook. All the stuff under Five's floorboard goes under hers. There are fake IDs and a heap of money. 

He had the same ideas as she did.

She never reads the book about sexual, romantic and gender orientations.

* * *

She's fourteen and standing in a pool of her blood, staring at her own body. 

She finishes screaming and asking questions and her reality sinks in.

She should feel something. Anything. All she feels is overwhelming relief. 

She doesn't have to play anymore.

She's free.

Her king was killed. 

Reginald won, but she can't seem to feel worried or disappointed.

She's been playing so long she doesn't know what to do now she's free.

She's dead, she cannot play any more.

There's a reason that to win the game you have to kill the king.

* * *

She's fourteen but her siblings are twenty-nine and she's staring at Five.

He looks the same and so does she, and yet he doesn't understand.

He never has.

She wonders if he remembers her loose floorboard. If he'd ever find her treasures and her notes. Her collections.

She watches him but he doesn't see her, he has never seen _her_. 

No one sees her, not while she wears deception and death like a second skin and lying comes easier than the truth.

No one sees her, not even herself. She looks in a mirror and has no reflection. She thinks maybe that's true no matter the fact that she's dead.

He comes with a story of death on an apocalyptic scale and it steals the breath from her.

He comes with a story that she believes in a second, she believes without question. 

_She knows._

She understands, she knows intimately what has such apocalyptic consequences. What move Reginald Hargreeves played that could cause such consequences.

She knows.

She knows that apocalypse just as well as she knows that her turn has come.

Reginald Hargreeves' death was his move. 

Now, it's hers.

It's time to make her move.

Her king hasn't been killed. Not yet. She has, but her king hasn't.

She was the queen. The queen has been taken.

Klaus is the king. 

Without him, she has no interaction with the physical world. 

He hasn't been taken. Not yet.

There's a new player on the board. Maybe they'd always been there. 

Hiding in the shadows. Hiding in a rift in space-time.

But this is _her_ game.

Her rules.

She's an expert in her game and she's not gone yet.

It's her turn.

And her king _hasn't_ been killed.

**Author's Note:**

> ok, so im not dead. and this wouldnt leave my head so have a character study of percy where i use her name like twice.


End file.
